Could the death of Léa, 19, have been avoided? This is the question that was asked throughout the hearing on Monday June 10 at the Le Mans court. In July 2019, the young woman was found dead of asphyxiation at the Rouvelière composting platform in Allonnes, buried under green waste.
The young temporary worker is only there a few hours a week. A small summer job found by his father, Alain, who is hired within the same company, the composting and recovery company in Le Mans. A subsidiary of Véolia responsible for receiving, sorting and transforming green waste.
Lack of security
There, she is responsible for sorting waste from individuals who sometimes leave bits of plastic or metal lying around in their bags filled with branches, leaves and grass. “We could never have imagined that someone would find themselves buried”, explains the former director of the site at the helm. The main danger at La Rouvelière is the collision between trucks and pedestrians. However, the labor inspection investigation shows that there are no markings on the ground to indicate traffic and no demarcation for the unloading zone. The young woman is trained for only half a day and is given the necessary equipment: helmet, pants with fluorescent stripes and protective boots.
She also had to work with removable barriers. That day, all the witnesses said the same thing: she did not use them. “But what purpose would barriers 1 meter long and 1 meter high have served to protect a kid – who was 1m50 tall – from trucks?”, denounces the lawyer of Léa’s mother and sister, who cannot hold back their tears. Since then, the site has been secured: the trucks return one by one, only the truck driver is authorized to walk on the site or is prohibited from coming within 3 meters of the waste.
No answer
In this case, the former director of the site and the Le Mans composting and recovery company were found guilty of manslaughter. The first was sentenced to six months in prison and a fine of 2,000 euros. The company must pay a fine of 40,000 euros. Faced with this decision, Léa’s father remains almost impassive. For him, it is not so much the conviction that matters, but more the truth.
The investigation was unable to determine the exact course of events. “I miss a part of the horror film. It’s very complicated to live without knowing what really happened. Every night, I relive this scene where I give him a cardiac massage”, confides Alain. It was he who found his daughter dead, when he joined her for a simple lunch.
